


against your lips

by twistedsky



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-28
Updated: 2014-11-28
Packaged: 2018-02-27 03:05:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2676653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twistedsky/pseuds/twistedsky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-the final battle of sorts. Vaguely not canon-compliant in certain places. Laura transfers from Silas, and Carmilla follows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	against your lips

**Author's Note:**

> For Sheree.
> 
> I wrote this a few episodes ago, so I had to rework some stuff, and therefore certain things are most certainly not canon-compliant. Plus, I'm not really sure what all of the accepted details are in this fandom, so if I'm wrong about something, I thought I'd just cover my bases.

Carmilla’s dead, Laura says, and for a while she wonders how she’s supposed to live with that.

Later, when Carmilla shows up alive, Laura thinks she knows what it’s like to experience a miracle.

~~

They survive, that’s the important part.

They win, too, and next year they all transfer, get the hell out of this seedy, demon-feeding university.

Laura’s sure that life goes on for everyone else, except now there’s new leadership(and fewer eyeballs in the cafeteria), but not for _them_.

LaFontaine and Perry end up halfway across the country, and Carmilla—well, she showed up, and she survived. That's what's important. 

Laura finishes the school year, and then she—well, she means to say something to Carmilla, but Carmilla disappears. She has the _words_ , Laura thinks. 

But Carmilla’s gone, and Laura doesn’t know where she is.

And that’s that, Laura thinks, packing up her books, her bedding, her defense weapons from her father, and leaving that godforsaken campus for the last time.

It’s better this way, she thinks, when Carmilla doesn’t even show up to say goodbye.

~~

Her new school is far less terrifying, and has a much shorter history, which heavily influences Laura’s decision to go there.

She feels safer surrounded by the modern world, like somehow that means that the seedy, dark underbelly of the supernatural world can’t still exist there, like it couldn’t still come for her at any moment.

It probably won’t, she knows, because she’s irrelevant now that there’s not anyone in particular gunning for her.

She lives off-campus, and she does so _alone_.

It feels safer this way, and maybe it is.

She goes to classes, and everything feels perfectly normal—or, at least, it should, but it doesn’t.

Two weeks into the semester, she walks into her apartment, and feels like she’s not alone, and there’s Carmilla on her couch, reading some book and drinking blood from one of Laura’s mugs.

“I let myself in,” Carmilla tells her. “I was getting bored outside.”

“Why are you here?” Laura asks, because she hasn’t seen her in months, and there must be a reason, right?

“Nowhere else to be,” Carmilla says. “Nowhere else I’d rather be,” she corrects, not even looking up meet Laura’s eyes.

Their previous interactions, especially right before Carmilla had up and disappeared, had been rather . . . chilly.

Okay, so maybe Laura wasn’t the _nicest_ when she’d kicked Carmilla out before she and the others had gone face-to-face with evil itself, but Carmilla had been willing to sell out random other people just for _her_.

And, let’s face it, that’s not as romantic as people think it’s supposed to be. It’s _awful._

Laura thinks Carmilla might understand that now—she’d shown up eventually, hadn’t she?

That makes all the difference.

“Are you going to  . . . stay?” Laura asks. “I mean, how long do you think you’ll be here?”

Carmilla looks up at her, and there’s just something on her face, like some kind of fear and hope mixed together. “I don’t know. Until you ask me to leave, I suppose.”

“Oh,” Laura says.

“If you want me to leave now, I suppose I can do that,” Carmilla says softly, “I just wanted to make sure that you’re safe and sound.”

Laura smiles slightly. “I appreciate that, I do. But I’m fine. You can leave whenever you like.”

“Or when you ask me too,” Carmilla says, and Laura heads to her little kitchenette. It’s small, of course, since it’s just her—or, well, since it was only supposed to be just her.

But it’s nice to have Carmilla here too, she thinks.

~~

There’s something that’s been bubbling under the surface between the two of them, and Laura can’t deny it any better now than she did before.

There’s something sensual about the way that Carmilla moves, something _intense_ about the way Laura feels when Carmilla’s hands are on her, or when she brushes past her.

It’s a lot, Laura thinks.

Technically, she and Carmilla haven’t discussed what they are except in vague terms—and definitely not since _it_ happened.

Not since the day she held Carmilla accountable for her choices, and Laura doesn’t exactly regret that, but she does wish she knew how to start anew with Carmilla.

She’s not really sure what Carmilla’s even _doing_ here.

Laura is guessing that she’s not going to school, but that still leaves a lot of options for the several hours she’s gone most days and nights.

Laura doesn’t ask, because when she’s around Carmilla, all she does is get awkwardly silent or start babbling on about irrelevant things that she’s not even sure _she_ cares about.

It just takes time, she tells herself.

~~

Laura’s feet are in Carmilla’s lap, and Laura’s not entirely sure how that happened, but she’s lying comfortably, studying for a midterm, and, well, it’s nice.

Carmilla is just listening to music and sitting there with her eyes closed.

“You should rest,” Carmilla says suddenly, and Laura jumps a little. “Sorry to scare you,” she says, and Laura—Laura should probably get some rest.

“Wow, is it already 3am?” Laura shakes her head, and then yawns, stretching.

Carmilla looks at her like she wants to say something, and Laura hopes she will, but then she doesn’t.

Instead, Laura just sighs. “Another hour, and then I’ll go to sleep.”

“You should sleep now,” Carmilla says.

She should, probably, but she needs to study too.

~~

She wakes up the next morning with her head in Carmilla’s lap, and her arms hugging Carmilla’s legs.

She carefully tries to determine how she’s going to untangle herself, but then Carmilla strokes her hair and sings to her, and _how_ is she supposed to move now?

It’s gentle and sweet, something that Laura sometimes forgets that Carmilla knows how to be.

Laura has _feelings_ for Carmilla, and she knows that Carmilla feels something for _her_ , she does.

It’s hard to put a name to it though—it’s why Carmilla’s here, and it’s why Laura isn’t asking her to leave or even just gently nudging her to do so.

It’s why it hadn’t been that hard to push Danny away last year.

Carmilla stops doing what she’s doing and sighs, and Laura wonders how much longer she should wait.

She misses the singing and the caressing almost immediately, but she could definitely have more of the latter if she could just say what she needs to say.

But she doesn’t, and so she fakes being asleep for a few more minutes before waking up suddenly and jumping off the couch, definitely late for class(but not for her midterm, at least there’s that).

~~

Carmilla is pretending not to watch her while she watches her again, and it should bother Laura, but it doesn’t.

Or, well, it bothers her, but not in the way she thinks it probably should.

Laura wonders if she should just come out and say it.

Be brave, and all that.

Face down an army of vampires? Easy.

Talk to one vampire that you might be a little in love with? Impossible, it seems.

~~

The holidays come up, and Laura's supposed to go home to visit her father. 

She’s not sure what to do about Carmilla though.

“I have—“ she says on the phone, talking to her dad. “I have a friend who doesn’t have anywhere to go—“

“Bring her with you,” he says, surprising her.

He’s usually against all strangers at all times.

“Oh, okay. Awesome.”

~~

“Would you like to come home with me for the holidays?” she blurts out.

Carmilla is changing channels on the television, and she looks up at Laura, her finger still on one of the remote buttons, and the television is speeding through channels. “Why?”

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. I’m just going home, and I wanted to know if you wanted to come with me?” Laura wrings her hands in front of her, trying not to be so nervous and failing miserably.

“Yes,” Carmilla says simply. “I would love to.”

~~

Carmilla brings Laura’s father flowers, and it’s . . . it’s sweet.

It’s a bit like courting, but let’s not be silly, Laura tells herself quickly.

Her father doesn’t trust people as a general rule, but after several minutes of tense stares and then deep, heavily invasive questions, he turns to Laura and asks if she can please go get the pie out of the kitchen, because she needs to eat.

Not enough meat on her bones, he says, and Laura shares a look with Carmilla, who nods, and then she wonders off to find the pie.

There is no pie, she concludes five minutes later, and when she goes back into the living room, her father is serving the pie.

She’s a little off-balance at this point, but then Carmilla looks up and smiles at her, and her nerves dissolve away.

~~

It’s nearly midnight their first night there, and Laura is in desperate need of a midnight snack, so she wanders down into the kitchen and grabs some cookies, and then upon a second thought grabs a glass and some milk.

“Your father seems nice,” Carmilla says, and Laura barely manages not to jump. It’s getting easier, she thinks.

“He’s my dad,” Laura says, “He’s usually only nice to me.”

“That’s what counts,” Carmilla declares, and Laura doesn’t know what to say to that, so she looks down and takes a bite of a cookie, and then takes a sip of milk.

“Thank you for bringing me,” Carmilla says softly, and Laura looks back up to meet her eyes and smiles slightly.

“Thank you for coming,” Laura says, and Carmilla smiles back.

“You have some milk—“Carmilla frowns, pointing to her own face to show where it is on Laura’s.

Laura plays dumb, and definitely doesn’t get the milk off her face. “Show me?”

Carmilla’s smile fades, and she reaches forward to rub it away with her thumb, and then Laura thinks they’re too close.

They’re often too close though, but somehow being here, in her childhood home, is making her feel _braver_ , almost.

Laura closes the distance between them, pressing her lips gently to Carmilla’s, and practically sighing because yes, good, _finally_.

It feels like she’s been waiting for an eternity.

When she pulls away, she smiles at Carmilla, who simply stares at her blankly for a moment. “I thought that would never come,” Carmilla says, and Laura laughs. 

“Me too,” she whispers, and then she can’t help herself, because she’s gotten a taste for it, she needs—she leans forward and kisses Carmilla again, this time a little less gently, and it’s just as perfect.

Finally, Laura thinks. Finally.

She has the words, but Carmilla knows them already. She whispers them softly against Carmilla's lips, and Carmilla smiles, then says them back.


End file.
